Cheree Kinnear gives the highs and lows of the weekend's sport all in 90 seconds. Video / Sky Sport / Photosport
OPINION:
It turns out that the Blues' big breakthrough moment wasn't in Christchurch a few weeks ago, but in back-to-back scrambling victories in Melbourne and Perth.
These last two weeks have provided the greater test of the Blues' character than the stonking, full noise all-Kiwi derbies which they faced intheir first eight games.
The mental fortitude and physical dedication it took to keep the Chiefs scoreless in Hamilton and then win an epic battle in Christchurch for the first time in 18 years was significant.
But their victories against the Drua and especially the Force on Friday night, gave a better indication of the resolve and belief that has pervaded the Blues in 2022.
Super Rugby, even now it has been reduced to 12 teams and lightened its carbon footprint, still demands an element of slogging it out in the trenches: of finding ways to dig out wins when there is no glitz or glamour to tap into.
It's a competition that still comes with a relatively high attrition rate and when the playoffs swing round in a month, the teams hosting home games will be those who showed as much heart and resilience on the little occasions as they did the big.
If the Blues push on to become champions, they will look back through their campaign and see that their ugly victories against the Drua and Force - games in which they didn't perform to expectation but still managed to collect the points – were every bit as important as the polished and clinical demolition jobs they did on the Chiefs and Crusaders.
The last two weeks have been a giant struggle for the Blues. Shorn of a handful of their All Blacks due to enforced rest protocols, missing others through injury and Covid and facing lower-ranked opponents who could sniff blood in the water, the Blues easily could have lost to one or both of the Drua and Force.
Almost certainly the Blues of old – the Blues of last year even – would have fallen at one of those hurdles: found a way to play well but lose.
The new trick they have shown this year is the priceless ability to play well below their best but win, and at the heart of their last four wins have been phenomenal defensive efforts.
Good teams all know how to win ugly, because good teams problem-solve in real time.
Good teams have enough collective spirit, cohesion and sheer bloody mindedness to let their inaccuracies wash over them rather than let every dropped ball pervade their psyche and destroy their confidence.
Issak Fines- Leleiwasa of the Force and Finlay Christie of the Blues compete for the ball during the Super Rugby Pacific Round 11 match. Photo / Getty Images.
Some nights just aren't meant to be in terms of performance and good teams accept that, but refute that those nights just aren't meant to be in terms of outcome and the nine championship points the Blues secured from their two-match tour of Australia are testament to them being a steely version of their former flaky selves.
Their defensive tenacity and desire to stay in the fight these past few weeks has been at a level not seen since they last won the title in 2003.
Having produced consecutively scrappy and unconvincing attacking performances, some may wonder whether the Blues are living on borrowed time at the top of the table, but their next two games are at Eden Park, where they can welcome back Rieko Ioane, Nepo Laulala, Tom Robinson and Hoskins Sotutu.
With Caleb Clarke, Roger Tuivasa-Scheck and Akira Ioane all having played in Perth after relatively long periods of inaction, the better analysis of the last two weeks is that they have been an aberration and the Blues, with a full contingent of personnel and deepened confidence, will rekindle the speed, intensity and precision they were building prior to their Australian sojourn.
Compare their doggedness these past two weeks with that of the Crusaders, who have faced the same access to players issues as the Blues, shown a similar inaccuracy and lack of cohesion, but have only won one of their two fixtures with another two in Australia still to come before they return to Christchurch.
What we have seen in the last two weeks is the monumental difference between winning ugly and losing ugly.
By scrapping their way to victory in Perth, the Blues have earned clarity and potentially a little room for error in the run home.
They can see that if they beat the Rebels and Reds at home, then they may only need to beat one of either the Brumbies or Waratahs to secure the top playoff spot when they return to Australia later this month.
The Crusaders on the other hand, after losing to the Waratahs in Sydney, know that realistically they need four bonus-point victories to have any chance of usurping the Blues from the number one spot.
